JCR-UK is a genealogical and historical website. It is not the official website of the organisation discussed below.

Movement for Reform Judaism

The Movement for Reform Judaism is the second largest synagogal movement in the United
Kingdom (the United Synagogue being the largest).
Membership of Reform congregations in 2016 (including the three unaffiliated Reform
congregations listed below)
constituted some 19.4% of synagogue membership in the United Kingdom.(1)

Reform is relatively traditional in comparison with its smaller counterpart,
Liberal Judaism, though it does not regard Jewish law as binding.

Basic Data

Name:

Movement for Reform Judaism

Former Names:

Reform Synagogues of Great Britain (1958 to 2005)

Associated Synagogues of Great Britain (until 1958), which evoved from.....

On 8 November 2010, 'The Movement for Reform
Judaism" was incorporated as a registered company (company no:
07431950), a private company limited by guarantee without a share
capital (and with an exemption from use of the word 'Limited').

It is also a registered charity (No: 7431950), registered on 12 January
2011

History

Although the first "Reform" congregation in Britain was founded in 1840, it took
more than a century before an synagogal organisation was established for the
Reform movement.

The first Reform synagogue (although it was some years befor that term was adopted), the
West London Synagogue of British Jews, was founded in 1840 by
19 dissatisfied members of the Bevis Marks Synagogue
(Spanish & Portuguese Jews) together with five dissatified members from the Ashkanazi
Great Synagogue. These members, which included the
wealthy Mocatta & Montifiore (Sephardi) and Ashkenazi Goldsmid (Ashkanizi) families, were complaining,
in particular, about the rigid regulations in the two synagogue in question. Members of these families Mocattas,
many of whom who lived in the West End of London, were forced to walk several miles to and from synagogue on the Sabbath due to
synagogue regulation banning prayer groups in a radius of six or ten miles from the existing (City)
synagogues.(2) On 15 April 1840,
these families held a meeting at the Bedford Hotel in London and declared their intention to to form a prayer group for neither "German nor Portuguese" but for "British Jews".
Their declaration included the following:

"We, the undersigned,
regarding Public Worship as highly conducive to the interests of
religion, consider it a matter of deep regret that it is not
frequently attended by members of our Religious Persuasion. We are
perfectly sure that this circumstance is not owing to any want of a
general conviction of the fundamentsl Truths of our Religion, but we
ascribe it to the distance of the existing Synagogues from the
places of our Residence; to the length and imperfections of the
order of service, to the inconvenient hours at which it is
appointed; to the unimpressive manner in which it is performed and
to the absence of religious instruction in our Synagogues."

Initially, the new congregation was essentially a breakaway Orthodox community. The new congregation had not been a deliberate premeditated breakaway
but its members had been pushed into existance by the refusal of the City synagogues to countenance a West End branch congregation. However, gradually
reforms were adopted deepening the ritual divide betwnn the Orthodox community and the breakaway congregation.

Other "Reform"-minded synagogues were gradually founded, in
particular Manchester in 1858 and
Bradford in 1872. However,
these congregations were neither organised together nor had a
consistent religious philosophy, to some extent the motives for
succession from the main stream congregations were more political than religious.
The first of these three breakaway synagogues to adopt full-fledged Reform Judaism was
the West London Synagogue in about 1930.

Congregations

When founded in 1942 the Movement had six constituent congregation(3).
Today there are 42 affiliated congregations(4)
spread throughout the United Kingdom

Balls Pond Road Cemetery, Kingsbury Road(disused), Balls Pond
Road, London N1In use from 1843 to 1951. A former cemetery of the West London Synagogue
(See
also
IAJGS Cemetery Project
- Balls Pond Road)

Hoop Lane Cemetery West(active), Hoop Lane, Golders Green, London NWII
The Hoop Lane cemetery was acquired
in 1894 by the West London Synagogue in 1894, the eastern (smaller) section of which was sold in
1896 to the Spanish and Portuguese Jews' Congregation (now the S&P Sephardi Community). (See
also
IAJGS Cemetery Project
- Hoop Lane.)

New Southgate Cemetery (active), Brunswick Park Road, London N11This
was a cemetery of the Hendon Reform Synagogue
and passed to the Jewish Joint Burial Society (see below) following that
synagogue's 2015 merger. The cemetery is almost full and any future
burial are primarily reserved plots for former members of the Hendon
Reform Synagogue. (See alsolso
IAJGS Cemetery Project
- New Southgate)

Burials through the Jewish Joint Burial Society (JJBS), which serves
29 member synagogues of the Movement for Reform Judaism, as well as a
number of Masorti, Liberal
and Independent
congregations. The following cemeteries are used by JJBS member
synagogues in or around Greater London:

Bulls Cross Ride Cemeteries(active), Cheshunt, Herts.
EN7 5HTThe principal cemetery of the JJBS, comprising the original
Western Cemetery as well as the newer Woodland Cemetery. The Western
Cemetery had originally been the cemetery of the Western (now Western
Marble Arch) Synagogue, as well as the independent West End Great
Synagogue. The JJBS's section of the cemetery . (See also
IAJGS Cemetery Project
- Cheshunt)

Edgwarebury Cemetery (active - see above), Edgwarebury Lane, Edgware HA8 8QP
JJBS arranges some burials at this cemetery for certain members
of Reform Synagogues, based upon pre-existing
arrangements with the West London Synagogue.

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